Iron not yielding, Rio Tinto wants to mine Indian talent

Pune, Sept 5: Rio Tinto’s two mining projects in India may have remained just that — projects and not operating mines — for more than a decade, but the global mining giant is looking to tap the country’s other natural resource — human talent. The metals and mining major plans to leverage India’s talent pool to drive innovation across the globe, making the business safer and more sustainable, Harry Kenyon-Slaney, chief executive, Energy, said. To harness its technology capability further, the company has reiterated its commitment to strategic partnerships in India.

Kenyon-Slaney said Rio Tinto has the Bunder diamond mining project in Madhya Pradesh and an iron ore venture in Odisha. “These are not operating mines, just projects,” he said. The Odisha project was signed in 1995 and the diamond project is 10 years old, but delays in approvals and regulatory issues have impeded the take-off.

Rio Tinto has been working with IGATE Corporation for the last two years, and a lot of work is being churned out of the Rio Tinto innovation centre at IGATE. Kenyon-Slaney inaugurated a new facility of the Rio Tinto innovation centre at the IGATE campus in Pune on Thursday.

“IGATE is a strategic partner helping us work on a range of important projects in technology development and process development that will improve safety, performance and environmentally sustain our business. We will leverage skills in India and the expertise,” he said. The centre, based here in Pune, is crucial to supporting the global growth and development of our “Mine of the Future” programme, he said.

John McGagh, head of innovation at Rio Tinto, said McGagh's team manages the flagship “Mine of the Future” programme, working with external specialists to develop, de- liver and implement stepchange technological solutions for Rio Tinto’s business. McGagh's team works with the Imperial College for specialty innovation and University of Sydney for robotics in mining. Through their partnership with IGATE, they had developed innovative solutions in different areas like improved shiploading (important for them as they ship 290 million tonne of minerals), consoles managing robotic drills in mining (deployed in Western Australia) and real-time 3D imaging of its mines across the globe.

The Rio Tinto innovation centre is part of the new IGATE campus in Hinjewadi, Pune. IGATE has set up IGATE Corporate University in the campus with an investment of $70 million, with capability to train 800 people at a time. Ashok Vemuri, president and CEO, IGATE Corporation, said it was part of the transformation plans at IGATE to make it a learning organisation.

The facility will also have a development centre housing 5,000 people. The centre will be developed in phases over the next three years, Vemuri said. Last quarter, IGATE's net hiring was 2,000. IGATE has 25,000 emplyees in India.